My Crazy Uncle (or Aunt)

To tweak the tagline of John Hughes’s Uncle Buck: “They’re crude. They’re crass. They’re family.” Just in time for Thanksgiving and the annual confrontation with the gnarlier branches of your family tree that comes along with it, a series delving into cinema’s rich heritage of unusual—to say the least—uncles and aunts. The colorful cavalcade of nutcase avunculi include a delusional gone-to-seed jock (Napoleon Dynamite), Jacques Tati’s delightfully dotty Monsieur Hulot (Mon Oncle), Jimmy Stewart and his invisible 6’3 ½” leporine drinking buddy (Harvey), and Cary Grant’s very naughty aunts (Arsenic and Old Lace). Say what you will about ‘em, at least these relatives keep things interesting at the dinner table.